


a newly written poem

by Twitter_hikari



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-02
Updated: 2017-06-02
Packaged: 2018-11-08 00:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11070669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Twitter_hikari/pseuds/Twitter_hikari
Summary: Only one person was supposed to put their heart in him.Instead he's got two, and he is fascinated by these children, not that much younger than he is.





	a newly written poem

**Author's Note:**

> It was supposed to be crack. And then it grew feels. I know who to blame.

Tom is a genius, but sometimes he could be a real idiot.

He didn't read the fine print or something, but only one person was supposed to put their heart in him.

Instead he's got two, and he is fascinated by these children, not that much younger than he is.

Ginny, the only girl, always expected to be one thing when she's dying to be another

And Harry, lonely and alone, and such a similar past that Tom can almost reach out of the diary from those emotions alone.

Tom loses interest in the basilisk, because he has these people who _rely_  on him for emotional support. No one has done that since before the incident with the rabbit at the orphanage. And this reliance is new and fascinating. He wishes to study it and them.

~*~ 

Harry spends the summer in Diagon Alley. Tom is left with a Ginny who is lonely again at the Burrow. The only girl, not wanted around her brothers. Worth defined by her gender. Her quill almost tears great rents in the pages of the diary. Tom feels more glutted than he has ever been. 

Harry meets up with the Weasley’s in the Alley. Ginny shoves the diary at him and walks away in a huff. That night, Harry sits down at the desk in his room and writes to Tom. Tom is ready for the loneliness, but Harry fills him with the mundane things living in Diagon Alley for three weeks.

~*~

Tom does not do well with the Dementors. More specifically, he does not do well with Harry’s reaction to the Dementors. That was the first time Harry and Ginny learned that Tom could come out of the diary. 

When Harry breaks his broom on the Whomping Willow, he doesn’t say anything to the team really. No broom, he can’t play. He misses flying. The stupid Cleansweeps don’t do anything right. Ginny commiserates, and that’s when Tom invites them into the diary. 

~*~

Ginny is determined to get Harry back on his broom. She badgers Professor Lupin to teach Harry about the Patronus Charm and bullies Harry out of his slump and into the classroom. Professor Lupin refuses to let her try, claiming that it was hard enough that Harry was doing this at thirteen, he was  _ not _ going to let her twelve year old self attempt to face the boggart. 

Tom teaches her. Inside the diary, they spend time going over the wand movements and incantation until Ginny is certain that there is something shimmering at the tip of her wand.

~*~

The stupid thing with Wormtail makes it’s way to Tom. Harry had been so ready to leave Privet Drive and those dreams had been dashed. Tom soothes Harry. It was hard to see his people so angry. 

~*~

Actually, of all the things that have threatened to split the three of them permanently, it was the graveyard at the end of the tournament.

Ginny remembers sitting in the stands, quill in hand as she and Tom wait for Harry to come out. They don't care if he wins, just that he is alive. Charlie has given Ginny some of the specs of the maze. The sphinx and the Acromantula make her quill stutter across the page as she relays everything for Tom.

Then Harry and Cedric have reached the middle of the maze. Ginny is relieved. Harry will be out and they could have a calm summer. Her quill is lowered to the page to tell Tom that Harry is out safely when the crowd in the stands have gone quiet.

They've disappeared. But not reappeared. Tom's writing rises to the page in spikey jerks, responding to the ever-widening blotch of ink on the page.

The diary suddenly *shrieks*. Ginny is panicked, covers it up with the excuse of dumping her ink bottle, which is a plausible excuse, seeing as how she and her robes are drenched in the ink that has suddenly seeped from the pages

Tom doesn't respond to her frantic message. Ginny feels very small and alone.

A chill sweeps over the stands and Ginny knows that magic. That is Tom's but older, angrier.

Emptier.

Some time passes while the teachers cluster with the Ministry officials. Percy is in there somewhere, Ginny knows. She got a letter from him about it.

Then a soft vibration catches her attention. It's Tom's diary. A soft golden glowing and then there is a thump on the green in front of the stands.

It's Harry.

He has Cedric with him. 

~*~

Harry rolls on the grass with a groan. Cedric coughs and sprawls next to him. The Portkey trip back was no less fun than the one that took them to the graveyard in Little Hangleton in the first place. Harry is glad that Cedric fell behind one of the taller head stones after Wormtail attempted to kill him. It was likely what had prevented Voldemort from actually killing him.

Harry and Cedric are hauled away from each other, both questioned. They testify that yes, Voldemort is back. Harry rubs his hands on his trouser legs. They feel weird after that gold cage thing his and Voldemort's wands did.

Fudge dithers for a while before dismissing their statements of Voldemort's return to power. They're just boys, he insists. Can't know what they're talking about.

_Cedric is furious when he hears of this dismissal later. He did not survive Death Eaters and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named just to be not heard. He searches out the Order of the Phoenix that summer, who send him Tonks and Kingsley's way. They could always use more Aurors._  

Ginny and Tom sneak into the Hospital Wing that night. Harry is there, *when is he not?*, and under the cloak of night and Invisibility, Ginny and Tom share what happened while Harry was in his battle.

~*~

That summer is the worst. Not as bad as it could have been. Harry has Tom. 

Ginny is going spare at Grimmauld Place, but she knows that the Order has plans to bring Harry. She bides her time, sneaking into the Black Library at night. She spends a large chunk of her time in the attic watching Buckbeak. Sirius is confused by this fourteen year old girl, but is reminded of the angry snap of teeth from another girl at and the flounce of red hair. He doesn't mention it, Ginny deserves to be her own person.

~*~

When the nightmares start, it's not of Cedric dying.

Well, they are. It's more what if he actually had died. And Cedric is replaced by others. Ron. Hermione. Neville, who has become more confident under the tutelage of the DA. Luna rarely stars in his dreams, he doesn't want her to.

Ginny and a young man with dark hair and eyes.

They are the most frequent replacements. Harry doesn't want them to ever be caught out, knows that Umbridge is setting them up for failure.

~*~

Frustration causes his already cramped writing to thicken to illegibility.

Tom just lets him rant. He knows the feeling of inadequacy, knows that there is nothin he can say that will help. So he waits until Harry has left small splotches on the page and Ginny is quietly doodling on the other. Then he suggests a movement, an association.

An Army. 

The DA starts small. Harry has been writing to Cedric over the school year, and Cedric is happy to relay his basic Auror training.

But then Cedric convinces Cho and Marietta. And Luna drifts in. The ranks swell, and with Cedric standing behind Harry, the students of Hogwarts are less vocal against him. Cedric was popular, and he levers that. Drops a word in an ear on a Hogsmead weekend. Makes rounds and suggests to parents that the Defense Association really is just concerned students who want to make the most of their education. 

Enough parents make noise to the Board of Governors that an inquiry is made into Umbridge. The blood quill comes up. The ministry removes her from the position and hastily removes the position of High Inquisitor.

The staff shuffled around, which lead to professor Snape teaching DADA and professor Slughorn coming out of retirement to teach potions. When Tom was told about their new professor, he filled the page with laughter.

~*~

There are these dreams. Harry doesn't like them, is tired of being woken by dreams of a dark room.

He explains them to Tom. Tom promises to teach him and Ginny occlumency. One never knows when they will need it.

And then the dream about Sirius in the Hall of Prophecy happens.

Harry is gone so fast. There is a quick note dashed in the diary for Tom before he and Ginny have gone with Ron and Hermione and Neville and Luna. 

And Tom is furious. 

He wants to be there for them, whispers to the Lovegood girl who picks the diary up. She knows better than the rest of them what they are going into and what the diary is.

He comes along tucked into a front pocket. Luna presses the diary into Ginny's hands before they enter into the Department of Mysteries. Ginny blinks at the book before patting the cover. She slips it into her pocket.  _ Stay with Harry _ , Tom whispers.  _ Stick like glue to him. You know what he gets up to. _

And does she ever. The TriWizard Tournament was the most awful thing.

Ginny shook herself out of the memories.  _ Careful  _ Tom whispered.  _ The Department of Mysteries has some strange effect of the mind. _ Ginny nods and darts forward to stick to Harry's tail.

It was a noble plan, and she would probably have been able to do it, but the Death Eaters forced a separation. She found herself fighting with Neville and Luna, backed against some shelves. Ginny bumped backwards and saw the tremble of a poorly grounded shelf. She grinned at the Death Eaters and shoved at the shelving. The prophecy orbs shatter and she laughs as the shelves collapse onto the three wizards menacing them. Ginny pats her pockets and finds the diary gone.

~*~

Harry knows that Sirius isn't here, so when he turns to see the Order flooding into the Department of Mysteries,  there's a moment of disorientation. He sees Sirius taunting Bellatrix,  _ knows _ that  is  _ wrongwrongwrong _ . His heart screams in denial as the jet of light knocks his godfather into the Veil.

The laughter in Sirius' eyes disappears.

~*~ 

He lunges after Bellatrix. She killed his godfather, she was going to die. When he catches up to the madwoman in the Atrium, and the  _ Crucio _ passes his a red haze descends over Harry's mind. He can feel the presence of Voldemort, the mastermind behind the nightmares and dream-visions. And he feels it tearing in two ways.  _ Let me in you fool! _   


_ Tom? _ Harry thinks. There is a weight in his pocket that wasn't there on the flight over.    


Bellatrix grovels at the hem of her Master's robes. The reptilian face hardly twitches at her actions. "We finally meet again Harry. What is it that you have for me?"    
His hand dips down and his finger brushes over the cover as the splitting in his head crescendos.

~*~

Tom has always had a semblance of a body. What worries and fears and love and protection that Harry and Ginny have put in his diary separately and together have ensured that he has enough energy to pull together a corporeal form. But it's just a shade. Dramatically diminished from what he used to be, goals drastically shifted from what they once were.    


So when he finds himself sprawled on the floor of the Atrium of the Ministry for Magic, his older ( _ twisted _ ) self standing with his wand glowing green at the tip, Tom reacts with the strongest piece of magic he can.    


His magic flickers and sparks, before dying out. Tom is stunned, this must be some side effect from the presence of so many horocruxes, but he is buffeted by the winds and shards of glass that come when Harry's hand clasps into his. Tom's magic crackles into life, leaving him breathless. Not even in his wildest dreams had he thought this could be the thrum of magic beneath his fingers.    


The snake looking version of him is standing with his wand limp. No spells come their way. It seems that his magic has deserted him.  Tom thinks back to how Ginny had dropped the wizards in the Hall of Prophecy and grins.    


_ Like this, _ Ginny whispers.  _ Follow the cleave in the rock and use leverage. _ His fierce lioness who roars into the winds against her.   


_ Gotta make it big enough to catch him, but not Bellatrix. _ Harry is tired and heart sore but so strong under that.    


Tom feels them together and brushes against their minds one more time, _ sorry _ , and sends Harry flying into an alcove and brings the ceiling down on his and Voldemort's head.

~*~

Harry can hear screaming. It's terribly loud and ringing in the Atrium. Oh, it's him, screaming for Tom to appear. He can feel people moving the rubble away from his alcove, the one Tom had flung him into before-, just before.    


But he can't feel Tom. The people are there now, moving him and Tom  _ isn't there _ . . A body is laying still and silent, half crushed by stone, but it's enough to identify the person.    


"There he is." Harry's voice is harsh from the screaming. "That is Voldemort and he is  _ dead _ . Now leave me alone and let my friends be."   


They had discussed the drawbacks of Harry's fame, once, him never being able to finish the school year. His friends hounded at every turn. Tom had suggested just going. Now Tom was gone and he twists to get back to the base of the fountain and the people let him. There's nothing there except a tiny book. Harry scoops it up and lets the healers and Aurors swarm him. It's gone foggy now, and Harry just wants Tom and Ginny.   
He just gets Ginny sobbing into his shirt, as the diary lays open with black ink dried on the page.   
_Tom are you there?_  

It turns summer. Noses are counted on both sides. Sirius is still alive, thanks to the timely intervention of Cedric with a quick 'Accio'. It saved him from plunging into the Veil and the healers were able to reverse the curse Bellatrix had cast. Wormtail cracks as the Dark Mark stops responding. Tonks takes great pleasure in hauling the coward in and through the proper trial.    


Harry leaves the Dursleys and doesn't look back.    
~*~

Harry feels the absence of Tom like a weight around his neck. He catches Ginny lifting her quill to write the amusing anecdote of the day. He finds himself doing it too. They can always turn to each other, but it is easy to pull each other off balance.    


They graduate. Harry first, with Ron and Hermione and Neville. Cedric comes to their graduation. His hugs for Ron and Hermione are tight, a relationship born from the damage the Department of Mysteries. Then Ginny and Luna. Luna leaves with Neville to go apprentice with Newt Scamander in America.    
Ginny and Harry work as best they can.   


Their rows grow to epic proportions, generally over highly dangerous activities. Sirius and Remus say that they have nothing on Lily and James. This is good. Neither of them is like the previous generation. They are their own people.    
Ginny copes with adrenaline. She goes around with Sirius on their motorbikes and works her way through the underbelly of London. Comes back with teeth bared, and slightly blood stained. Sirius quietly suggests becoming a hit wizard.    


Harry doesn't want to fight. He is good at it, but there was a loss of satisfaction. It will always be a reminder to him of how he lost Tom in the most important fight of his life. Harry quietly looks into healing, apprenticing himself and working through his requirement before going off with Ginny. They tour the world for a while, finding trouble and fixing it. Harry's always had that saving people thing.    


Neither of them expected to be in Albania.

~*~

If you ask Ginny, Albania had clusterfuck written all over it.    


It was a dodgy job, with a shady contact. Everyone knew that Albania had its weird magical quirks. It was like someone had taken the Bermuda Triangle and shaken it out! No one accepted jobs to Albania. Except this dumb idiot.    


She looks at Harry with a smile. They were good together. Not like what they had with Tom, but still good. She's surprised that they even made it after they both started their post Hogwarts education. Harry had been determined to keep her safe, refused to let her go anywhere without him there. The screaming match over that had ended with months of radio silence. They had both thrown themselves into their work.    


The separation was good. Made them learn who they were without Tom. Harry came out of it with a bleeding heart that couldn't say no to a pair of Krup puppy eyes from the local kids.    


And Ginny was still the sap who gave in to his own Krup puppy eyes.    


Which was why they were in the middle of BFE, and Harry was talking to a snake.

~*~

If you ask Harry, Albania was a godsend. Ginny had been chomping at the bit to go nuts on something, so what better than some place that had no people and they just had to go track down this relic that was causing weird weather patterns.    


He spells up a basket and the Runespoor slithered into it. He had to promise it three mice to ensure cooperation, but damn, he was excited.    
"There's a clearing not that far ahead that the Runespoor says is the center of the patterns."   


He catches Ginny rolling her eyes. "Whatever it is hero, it'll need to wait until tomorrow." They set up the tent with ease and spell wards up. Harry takes the time to watch the sun dip behind the trees and tuns to head in to where Ginny is sitting with a journal.    


They both had them and wrote regularly. Habits are hard to break, especially ones made over years of time. Harry made to shut the flap behind him when a grey mongoose walks into the campsite.    


It rears up, growing larger by the second until a man with dark hair and eyes stands at the edge of the wards.    


"It certainly took you long enough."

~*~

When Tom is asked, why Albania, he smiles and shakes his head.  "Some unfinished family business. Harry and Ginny were kind enough to help me. Our correspondence had been ongoing for years before they came to Albania." He shrugged a little helplessly.    


"It was rather funny. I received a love poem that Ginny had intended for Harry. I responded, and was drawn to them." His eyes flash red as he looks out the window. It was a trick of the light. He smiles and it's like the sun piercing through a cloud bank. Tom moves to the door and crouches, catching the small child that came barreling inside. Harry bears another on his hip and leans in to give Tom a kiss. Ginny ducks past them and Tom catches her for a hug.    


A little diary rests on the table in the kitchen. It is small and worn, ink stained and faded. It is filled with words and pictures. It documents their life.    


> _ The word love has always tasted like the scent of fresh ink and soft paper to me. Like a newly written poem. _   
>  Megan Hart, Tear You Apart

 


End file.
